Loyalty
by Aisling Yinyr Ngaio
Summary: Ep1x07. Agent Victoria Hand does not trust easily, especially not hackers whose loyalties were opaque or non-existent. Written for MAoSWinter2013.


_**Loyalty  
**An Agents of SHIELD fanfic by Aisling Yinyr Ngaio  
_

* * *

She'd heard of him before, of course she had. He was notorious within the organisation even before his infamous death and recovery during the Battle of New York. One of Director Fury's favourite agents, he'd served the organisation with nary a blemish on his track record… at least on the surface.

Victoria read between the lines of Phil Coulson's history while awaiting for Agent Shaw's extraction and return to the Hub. If there was one weakness to be said about Coulson, it was that he had a history of recruiting dubious personalities. High risk targets with incredibly unclear loyalties who would've been immediately neutralised had it been any other agent, Coulson would recruit and retrain and induct into SHIELD.

She didn't know whether to be impressed or irritated. No doubt about it that Red Room-trained Natasha Romanoff had more than proven her worth as a SHIELD agent, but she could've easily gone both ways, especially considering the nature of her training. Espionage. Masters of liars, information extraction and betrayals. Conditioned to be loyal to no one but the organisation in which she belonged.

Then, the Avengers. Victoria silently eye-rolled at the name only Fury could've thought up. A team that included an infamously mercurial playboy who flew in the face of authority for fun, a twitchy scientist who was unsuccessful at exerting full control over the beast he was now sharing his body with, and a so-called god from Norse mythology who played by another set of rules than they did. At least they had three soldiers in the team who knew their duties to balance out the complete and utter disarray it would have otherwise created. By all reports of the entire Battle of New York, both the official SHIELD reports and unofficial gossip from the agents on duty at the Helicarrier, starting from the failure of Project Pegasus to the mop-up of New York, the Avengers might have won the day, but only very barely did.

And now, the new threat. One, moreover, who'd already been caught once and electronically tagged. Victoria scoffed. Hard to assess the full damage to their data streams before Coulson finally wised up and put a clamp on her internet freedom, especially if there was no telling how truthful she was being when she confessed. If what she'd heard about the new girl was true, her real loyalties were to no one but herself. Not even the Rising Tide, of which she was formerly affiliated, held any sway over her.

Such a free agent was at best, untrustworthy, and at worst, a danger to the organisation at large, especially if she was going to learn all sorts of classified information before she even reached Level 1.

Victoria's eyes narrowed, and she went over the decrypted intel sent over by SHIELD-616 an hour ago. Perhaps there was a way to kill two birds with one stone. If this girl's hacking abilities were really superb enough for Coulson to allow her to remain on his team despite her disloyalty, then the Hub would be the ideal bait. Likely neither she nor her former hacker friends would be able to resist the lure of classified information just waiting for them to crack into. And her test of loyalty, even if she didn't know it yet, would be set against the lives of her teammates, the people she'd lived with and interacted with for these past few weeks. One small test at a time.

_How far does your loyalty go, little girl? Which path will you take?_

Agent Victoria Hand smiled as she received the news of the arrival of SHIELD-616 and sent Jasper Sitwell to meet them. After all, while Agents Ward and Fitz were well-trained and excellent in their respective disciplines, they were by no means as irreplaceable as the damage the girl could wrought if she suddenly decided to double-cross SHIELD. This was a perfect opportunity to test the mettle of both the newcomer… and as a reminder to Coulson of the organisation he still belonged to after being used to making his own calls for too long now. After all, as SHIELD agents, they all had to answer to someone eventually, even Director Fury himself.

_- Finis -_


End file.
